How Vote Leave plan to persuade the electorate that there are real risks to staying in the EU

The IN campaign’s plan for victory in this EU referendum is relatively simple.  ‘Do you want the status quo or the riskt alternative?’, is how one Cameron ally sums it up.

To date, Remain—aided by the various government dossiers—have been pretty effective at pushing this message. That is why they are ahead in the polls.

So, Vote Leave know that they need to push the risks of staying in, up the agenda. I write in The Sun this morning that their message in the coming weeks will be that ‘wages will be lower and taxes will be higher if stay in the EU’. Their argument will be that the continuing troubles in the Eurozone will hit the UK in two ways. First, this country’s EU budget contribution will get bigger and bigger as the UK economy will be growing while the Eurozone one is stagnant. Second, the high levels of unemployment in the Eurozone will lead to more and more immigration into the UK; pushing down wages and heaping extra pressure on housing and public services.

Leave will also make the case that EU rules, which Britain, can’t veto will reduce this country’s comparative advantage in a whole host of sectors including financial services. The result of this would be lower tax revenues and less money to fund public services such as the NHS.

How effective the Out campaign can be in pushing the risks of staying in up the agenda will be crucial to the result. If the electorate think that the risk is all in leaving, then In will win. But if they start to think that there are real–and serious–risks to both courses of action, then Vote Leave will have a chance.